Pakistan Tour (UAE) 2015

How to Lose a Test Match in Forty Five Minutes

Day Three

Morning everyone.

Much anticipation this morning given the state of the match.

For a change we purchase tickets in the cheap seats today, just £4 to get in, and we are surprisingly soon joined by PC Tintin, Tufty and Luke, who appear no worse for their ‘Brunch’ experience yesterday.

England progress serenely for the first thirty minutes or so, then Root is caught behind, and this starts one of those dreadful collapses that England seem so good at.

We are bowled out before lunch with the last 7 wickets falling for just 36 runs, which in the context of this game is a disgrace.

The middle order performs like a chocolate fireguard, with Stokes, Buttler and Rashid especially disappointing – the shot by the latter as he was dismissed would not have been out of place in a primary school playground.

Basically we have now lost the game within a period of about 45 disastrous minutes.

During the interval we hear more from PC Tintin about the ‘Brunch’ session yesterday, while I wonder if the England team were enjoying a ‘Brunch’ of their own, judging by the batting we have just witnessed.

Apparently, all the locals the Addis boys met in their chosen bar, The Yew Tree, were ‘basically dicks’ including an American military attaché, whose conversation ran on a loop thus:

“I’m telling ya fellas, in thirty minutes this bar will be FULL of broads!”

Followed by a load of verbal diarrhoea until the loop started once more.

Perhaps unwisely, our lads accepted an invitation back to the military man’s apartment after the ‘Brunch’ had finished, where he plied the boys with malt whisky and then showed them his weapon.

This all sounds depressingly familiar!

Crestfallen by England’s terrible performance that morning, we left the ground early to sample the hotel swimming pool.

A subdued evening in McGettigans followed, where we watched a load of big South Africans unsuccessfully chasing an egg shaped ball around on the sports screen.

Hopefully in two months or so we will be watching a different group of South Africans unsuccessfully chasing a small round ball to all parts.